rapturerebornmmorpgfandomcom-20200216-history
Part 136
Sitemap '--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ' Lots More Fabulous Items/Ideas For a BioShock Rapture MMORPG '--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ' Part 136 --- --- --- --- --- --- A Streetcar Named "Dystopia" ... ''' : Can you actually call Rapture (as shown in the BioShock games) a "Dystopia" - ((which is supposed to be a place running 'normally' in its state)) ? That's like calling a European city a 'dystopia' after its been bombed out in WW2, or that 'Walking Dead' world a 'dystopia' (a place in free-fall doesn't quite fit that word, does it). Is YOUR society YOU live in TODAY a 'dystopia' because some people are unhappy and some others struggle in it ?? (BTW - welcome to ALL OF HUMAN HISTORY). Before Fontaine/Atlas's terrorism, WAS the Rapture Ryan built a 'dystopia' or much like what you see in the game?? Little was really shown of 'BEFORE', and what you see in-game (ruins, corpse everywhere, and crazy murdereous people wandering the street) is the result of what happened starting with Kashmir. (BaS1, for what its worth, shows little 'dystopia' -- particularly all the newspapers and the NPC's talk). WAS the 'BEFORE' unrest (caused by economic hardships for some citizens) sufficient to meet that definition ?? Was that experienced by any majority of the population ? We don't have much to judge that by, do we ? Remember the story said that the Kashmir Massacre was such a shock to Rapture. AFTER that time when the chaos began (the Terrorists attacks, followed by mass-insanity, and Rapture is destabalized almost completely) things werent 'normal' in any way. People suddenly were very afraid/arming themselves/calling on Ryan to protect them. The story/plot says the mass ADAM insanity was rather suddenly released. ((''AND We really aren't made aware of how the larger Rapture post-Kashmir society system operated - there was the usual vagueness avoiding most details, and the ouright lying of the info being fed you. We walked through only a small part of Rapture. '')) To be a "Dystopia", Rapture should have been like that beach party going on in Columbia, existing alongside the tyranical terror-driven slavery/serfdom and public executions every week - A place/situation being stable with that disconnect between parts of its society. For Rapture to be like that kind of situation, you would have kept getting Radio messages from Ryan where you can hear the BIG Party going on in the background (evidence of all the affluent people living it up, while the 'downtrodden' are suffering). Meanwhile YOU as Jack would be fighting your way through the ADAM sucking mutants and gunslinging mayhem in the broken/shitty parts of Rapture. It wasn't like that -- more like YOU are wandering through the chaos of a bombed out city, no? --- --- --- '''Fewer Layabouts the Better : Perhaps Rapture Society had an advantage because the 'lazy' and 'layabouts' mostly wouldn't have gone there, and neither would any of the welfare mooches or hand sitting bureacrats who managed them. So with most everyone pulling their weight there it would be more affluence on average. The writers make fun of "someone has to clean the toilets", but as a neccessity and with wages negotiable, then that might be a rather well paying job. And if you shirk a unsavory job, then there likely would be someone else to do it for enough cash. As mentioned elsewhere, someone innovative might even come up with a "toilet cleaning machine" to make it less 'unsavory' and increase efficiency. --- --- --- The Fix is In : They (the writers) had to have Ryan and the people of Rapture go against their nature for their 'plot'. They had to subject Rapture to a severe 'Shock' (which, BTW, would far more easily destroy OUR world). The writers had to make many/most inhabitants suddenly insane to deny them what they WOULD HAVE DONE - what THOSE people (of that time and ones who would BE in Rapture) would really do. So many are shown turning atypically (rather instantly) against Ryan, during a sudden society-shaking emergency. Its all rather heavy handed, all to MAKE Rapture a dystopia ((for this Shooter Game)). The writers had to make the Inhabitants into non-entities - INCAPABLE of taking action for their own safety, and then not having any loyalty to Rapture's Philosophy. Their passivity was required, no matter how unreasonable/illogical that was made. They didn't seem like the people who WOULD BE in Rapture, did they ? All (OMG !!!!) strong measures to handle the emergency are shown taken by Ryan -- all to put all the blame on him for the state Rapture is in. All evidence is created to reinforce the lies Fontaine spews at you. By intervening in an emergency Ryan is labeled as "going against his Philosophy", which is one of the biggest lies forced on you in the game (and is just a setup for that atypical/illogical surrender scene forced on him by the writers). The inhabitants in the game were manufactured, conveniently, into the Politically Correct Acceptable GAME opponents (mutants/zombies/killers/crazy/minion-of-a-dictator) -- to provide corpses for the ambiance, and so Jack could slaughter them without consideration of their humanity. In short, it was a rather writer-contrived/forced Failtopia, which nothing logical or likely was allowed to prevent/oppose. Better storytelling could have made it MUCH more plausible (and deeper than all those cardboard cutouts you were presented with). Hence my version of the FIXED story : Filling in for the limited (forced) VAGUE perspective the Player had, where YOU were lied to/manipulated completely, AND how Ryan actual won (rather logically) in the end - And Rapture didn't die. --- --- --- YOU BE Stuck With Them : Does it seem that half the stupid things in the Infinite BS game(s) existed because the Artists/writers came up with them, and they got stuck once the development was done and then the games story was REVISED ? * Skyline and hook (concept was completely crippled after they couldn't do THE BIG CITY SKYLINE activity.) * Quantums props - unique events reduced/degenerated into limited canned repetition and merely serving as a crutch for story progression ( '' jump to a different universe to 'solve' a problem '' ) * Zeppelins on the Brain (( '' Those 'plush-toy ready' designs - after Zeppelins no longer made sense '' ) * Police State in the Holy City. (( '' gots to have lots of shooting and killing in whats mostly a 'shoot-em-up' game '' )) * Attrocious Gianourmity and Biggification (general lack of detail on the human level - '' cuts production costs '' when time and money running out). * "THIS IS AMERICA" dystopia theme (when any imbecile can tell it ain't anything to do with real America) * Time Travel, Science Fantasy (they dropped the Luddite sub-plot elements where there would have been societal friction over all this weird NEW Sciencey crap, by the ordinary people). * Flawed Timelines - early character 'histories', cobbled together, which after rewrites make no/little sense. (( '' An Obvious rush job '' )) * Handyman (Frankenstein Mosnters who MIGHT have evoked some empathy, except THAT would have require more 'story' development effort). --- --- --- The Handyman (With Its Artist's License) Design ''' : With those two big exposed wire (back to shoulder), without any particular reason to exist (except as some minimal-detail MECHANICAL 'look' the artists concieved). Actually a lost opportunity for another 'weak spot' for the Player to target. Consider it being the same as "Spacesuits" in various movies having a tube leading to the helmet, which is just waiting to be ripped out and suffocate the Astronaut (strange when a dozen other systems have to go into the helmet without being '''conveniently exposed on the exterior ...). SO a nice way to get the Handyman if you can manage to shoot one of those wires, no? (( '' MMORPG will redo this Farce of a Travesty '' )) ) Big wires - they learned how to make them flexible 30 years before Columbia launched, and where they are place on that suit they don't really need to flex much anyway. Could you Snipe (rifle) target those things in this game ? Cut off half the monstrocity's power and watch it flop around like it had a stroke which took out half its body!!! *OR* have it short out and go up in a crackling electrical storm. Instead - there's that RETARDED Giant exposed Heart (( '' for that "Heavy Hitter" over-contrived thing's obvious "artificial weakness" '' )). It virtually screams at an enemy : "HERE IS the most Vulnerable Part - Please Don't Damage It !!!". Yeah, that's logical (in something of this game's quality). Heh, with FloatyShit™ you coulda had the 'Handymen' just be a big head and have its arms (4 now ?) floating about -- and it being JUST as menacing (if not creepier) to the Player. (( '' Imagination is a matter of degree, I guess, as is Talent. '' )) (('' Hey, isn't that what those weird BaSx DLC Pneumo Line things basically were - minus the quantumz BS ? Unfortunately - they didn't DO anything interesting with that in THAT game, either. '' )) --- --- --- Game Assets Another MMORPG Game Asset - Achievements ' : All kinds of *Player Achievements* (for those who like achieving them, and for amusement of all the rest). Done via . Player Created Assets, systemized to add all kinds of 'Achievements' into the game. This is fairly simple (compared to other Asset Types) as it only requires tracking system logic for the usual headcount type statistics (with some scripted-logic conditions and criteria), and some pretty 2D (or 3D ?) asset 'Achievement Token' (those being easy-peasy compared to many other (interactive) game Assets - the good Artistry/Imagination being the 'skill' needed). A display/interface (of all achieved/progress 'Achievements') being viewable to the Player (prominently if they wish, and 'inspectable' by other Players ('Achievements' are only half-good if others don't know about them). Probably we can have can have a 'residence' display of some kind to make it more frequently visible (trophy case, etc..). This (of course) would have the Usual MMORPG vetting/testing mechanism applied to weed out inappropriate Assets. --- --- --- '''An Early Design For Rapture was going to be in Space, and also run by a Cult in an Underwater Nazi Base ' : Been there, Done That. See : Rapture On The Moon (all things are possible with the MMORPGs tools and processes) --- --- --- ' Andrew Ryan : "I will make no Proclamations, I will dictate no Laws". ' : Unfortunately when terrorists start slaughtering the Citizens, and try to destroy Rapture, things have changed and action must be taken. Flawed assumptions were pushed at and onto the Player ... intentionally (to justify that weak 'twist', it is very sad that it went that way when there was so much potential). Investigate what various Real World leaders do/did as War Measures. (( '' This Ryan 'betrayed his Philosophy' shit was so lame, and demonstrates the writer's lack of knowledge about History and Society). --- --- --- 'Comstock Refers to the World Below as "Sodom" ' : But isn't Columbia a flying "Sodom" full of evil and arrogance - filled with unholy idolatry ("A White Sepulcher Filled With Corruption") ?? That Wouldn't be lost on any real Christian people. So maybe there really weren't that many of THOSE in Columbia (the religion there isn't "Christian" anyway - so the writers really aren't that clever -- just devisive). So many there maybe are just Opportunists, who make a good life enslaving those Untermenschen unfortunates who somehow fell under their power (( '' Why would those victims EVER come to Columbia, or stay there ?? -- Don't look to the game writers for any logical answer to THAT question. '' )) Sad, if THAT all is the flawed impression that Levine has of religious people (Why else does he portray (so heavyhandedly) all these attempted associations with "America", if its NOT trying to be a generalization ??) --- --- --- 'Things the MMORPG Shouldnt Have In It ' : * No breaking of realism, breaking common sense, or design decency to make a game mechanic work. Lazy/inept writers/designers/programmers come up with such things and shouldnt be tolerated. * No Impervious Locked Doors - In the MMORPG there will Always be something there. * No invisible walls, or obviously insufficient movement obstacles (all MMORPG terrain is to be actual and all blockages real under the standard Game Mechanics). * No ridiculously needless Fetch missions (the sad "bread and butter" of most MMORPGs who 'pad' their games to save costs). * No Worthless Loot. The Player (having encumbrance limits) has enough to do without wasting their time. Anything you find could have some use/value. * Don't ignore Psychotic Player behaviour - have NPCs dish them some lumps, and if they persist kill them/beat them up (Jail cells and hospital beds to give them a chance to contemplate their errors). * No Islands of corpses you create in kill-for-loot/body-count Mission sandbox playing. That's for lame-arsed games. * No Overly long NPC Monologues (explain basics and player can have an interactive question/reexplain/clarify dialog interface). * No Evaporating Bodies (game shouldn't have so many corpses - the MMORPG wouldnt be a 'body count' game). * Don't run out of things to spend money on - Bigger, better even if its just Residence decorations/elaborations. * No Bullet Sponges (opponents) - damage should be appropriately matched. A harder opponent should be more capable instead of the design simply cranking up their hitpoint stats or their offensive/defensive coefficients. * No reliance on "Quick Time Event" type of situations, where your fate is determined by how fast you can mash buttons. * The Cutscene Takedown - Player isn't rendered powerless (controls locked) while a precanned sequence determines his fate (used for a forced plot). * No Mysteries for Crafting. Information should be explained in-Game. You need pieces or tools to make something, they should all be spelled out. --- --- --- Infinite BS The Players Never Got 'Lets Correct the Bullshit, And Make Infinite More Of What It SHOULD Have Been ' : Use the MMORPG Tools/Processes/People to REDO Infinite BS into what it should have been (AND BETTER). It still can be Fantasy, but not the half-assed 'explaining the Fake' BS. '''WHAT THEY DIDN'T DO ... it very well could have been a FAR better game. It is actually sad to see Levine do all those interviews/promotional-spiels about ALL what he planned/wanted to do in Infinite BS (so much shown was on early trailers and demos at Electronic Entertainment Expos), but he never delivered. There are rumors that the WHOLE project quite late was in a mess, and the last year or so they had to largely Rewrite and Redesign the game, throwing previous work together into a disjoint smaller game (and throwing out ALOT of good/interesting stuff), RESULTING in that forgettable scatalogical plot and hokey Player experience. Elizabeth (in the earlier plots) was going to manipulate the 'Quantumz' quite a bit more, with many Player choices which shaped the game situation -- more than JUST a linear game sequence with YOU choice-lessly Jumping-Through-Tears to forward the plot. They chopped Tears back to materializing canned/static helper things (repeatedly) in the big staged-gun-battles. Tears were reduce to mere props, when they should have been an important ACTIVE element of the game. A game with Plot/Story shaping by the Player takes alot of development skill/talent/effort to do -- so therefore was eliminated in Infinite BS. That CAN be added properly in the MMORPG -- by Players who have Skill, Talent and are willing to go to the Effort. Combat improvements - thats obvious. The Players got Fancy 'Pretty' Terrain which really mattered little to the game - lots of potential lost there (which can be reclaimed). A Bigger element could be made of the story/scenes of that Terrorist 'Vox' faction in Columbia. It appears they downplayed significantly (it not being PC to show Anti-Establishment terrorists in a bad light) even though an Anarchist element WAS part of that historic 'America' the writers claim the game was about. The Player was going to take a side (Murderous Founder vs Murderous Terrorist) which would have been rather controversial (too controversial it seems, no matter what Levine claimed about "pushing the envelope"). It is rather hard to contrive a story about a "Bomb Throwing Anarchist With A Heart" and not set off red flags in the current "sane-part of" our society. Lets have more background, more backstory that makes sense, timelines that make sense, less faux science/history/religion, more interaction, etc ... Even if it is still Fantasy, it can be vastly improved. That interactive BIG cityscape level (with a much more complex Skyline interaction) got Big Wows at the trade shows and 'trailer' promotions, but finally turned out to be just a bait-and-switch tactic (( a fraud really, which game companies seem to do alot these days). That could be added back as a significant part of the game AND DONE RIGHT. --- --- --- ref Little Sister I Robot, Little Sister : As the Civil War proceded, there was greater demand for ADAM, and Ryan sought increased ADAM production. First - on Suchong's recommendation, most of the Little Sisters Ryan inherited from Fontaine were converted to "Gatherers". With their losses to Splicers, even after 'Protectors' were deployed, Ryan then (as the BS2 plot says) turned to McClendon Robotics to improve his ADAM supply problem by creating a batch of robotic Gatherers. Unfortunately, the project did not succeed, as the Big Daddy Protectors ignored the too-mechanical robotic Gatherers. Any plans to arm the Robotic Little Sisters, to have them protect themselves, might have been underway when the Events of BS1 took place. A Project to breed large numbers of ADAM Sea Slugs had long since failed under Fontaine (It would have been the simplest solution, but obviously wasn't done). Contrary to what was implied (but not stated) in the BS1 game, there is no proof Ryan kidnapped children to make NEW Sea Slug Symbiants -- That was originally the criminal work of Fontaine, and likely continued when he became Atlas (to supply his terrorists with ADAM). Even the Novel never says the kidnappings shown were at Ryan's orders/being condoned, and there is plenty of evidence of ADAM bootleggers and other parties producing ADAM in Rapture (signs in BS1). Why should Ryan pay/go to the trouble to make Protectors IF there was the easier solution of just kidnapping lots of children ? Possibly "The Thinker" research was partially paid for by McClendon to make the Artificial Intelligence the Robotic Little Sisters would need to operate. Perhaps, if the writers hadn't contrived to kill him off, he would have been allowed to use his knowhow and imagination to turn the Robots into Security Devices (Seriously, in BS2, they had the robot LS Asset made (minus the animations), and the context existing, to add another potential opponent/hacked-helper to the game. But Minerva's Den being DLC, they likely were incapable/unwilling to go to the extra effort.) We can still expand upon that concept in the MMORPG. '-' We never DID hear exactly how much (more) ADAM was recovered from corpses (it had to be sufficient to justify riskily sending the valuable Little Sisters out to get it, rather than having them sit safe in some well guarded place and generating 20-30X what the normal Sea Slug generated). Of course, when you run out of un-tapped corpses of Splicers, then the whole GATHERING thing becomes rather pointless anyway. For us, it was a case of the game plot saying "it must be so", logic or no, to force this whole "Little Ghoul" element of the game (( '' that empathy Save/Harvest stuff mutated from a System Shock-like alien something-or-other '' )). I would think having men or Big Daddy 'COLLECTORS' (rather than Protectors) who drag the corpses TO the Little Sisters in their WELL PROTECTED SAFE places would have been a LOT less risky in managing such an important resource. Such logic/practicality would completely change the Player's activity/interactions with the eventual ICONS of the game (( '' apparently the first BioShock had to be completely rewritten/redesigned more than halfway through its development, likely making it a far poorer game than it might have been, because of all the wasted effort and time '' )). --- --- --- ' "Grand Theft Rapture" -- Just an Idea' --- --- --- Columbia's Skyline - Designed by People on LSD (Ergot Poisoning Maybe?) : * No reason for those tight curves (Columbia is a big place - you don't need tight curves). (( '' Perfect for exaggerating exciting sorta-flying moves though ... '' ))) * No reason for steep rollercoaster dips (great for crushing/shaking-up freight/passengers, or for exciting graphical game movement). (( '' Again for effect in a game - not freight or passenger safety/comfort '' )) * No support for the Tracks (Oh, that Quantumz stuff ... but I though thats a Particle 'Fixed in Space' thing, which really is pretty nonsense when Columbia happens to 'move'). "That Witchcraft !!!! - I ain't goin anywhere near that Satan Spawned thing!!!! TO HELL WITH THE FALSE FOUNDER COMSTOCK !!!!!!!" * No Passenger traffic use - when it IS the obvious way to get around ALL of Columbia without 5 other transportation methods being required in a terribly/inefficient disjoint system. Seriously, doing it RIGHT would have been something for the original 'Show City' Exposition operation. (( '' Bad/sloppy design to shape a game is so easy to spot. '' )) * No visible way to drive the things on the track (so it is Quantumz Magic again ?). Sorry no. That facocta rotating blade hook thing cannot turn like that to pull you along -- its mechanically impossible.) * Skylines Usually run within a small loop within a game level (thus pointless as transportation - its alleged reason for existing.) * Created simply as a game mechanic, and THEN downsized to be a shaddow of what was origibally shown (in Trailers) because the big game possibilities it showed really could NOT be delivered. (( '' That is : If they EVER intended it to be what was seen as in the Trailer Videos - it was great promotional stuff.' ' )) * Stupid Skyhook thing (made into a commercial product in Columbia yet !! ). No sane person would want to ride thje Skyline like that. Kenny, If you wanted a chainsaw weapon, then have a Chainsaw. (( '' Did they first think "WE NEED A WAY TO CUT SOMEONES HEAD CLEAN OFF" ??? ... Yeah, 'Story' ... '' )) * One 'Skyline' runs around like a Rollercoaster WITHIN the Hand of the Prophet -- '' Contriv-itus Zeppelin on the Brain. (( '' Yes, all Zeppelins had a rollercoaster - it was first started by the Germans ... '' )) * The whole 'jumping onto' (and off) the Skyline thing is a great activity for pulling limb joints out of their sockets (or plunging you to your death). (( '' All those imbicile writers should be forced at gunpoint to hang by one arm from a simple pullup bar for only a minute to teach them how stupid the idea is '' )). * Used in place of having some neat Flying personal stuff for the Player (a logical Quantumz technological advancement) BUT it woulda messed up their still-mostly 2D design of the game (( '' Sorry, you did NO big game advancement Kenny '' )). Having something on tracks lets them control players access to the scene (important when the levels have to be generically small and linear). * Coulda had a 'Heavy Hitter' opponent (A "Security Train" pix, or the like, to run on these rails), but sorry, the writers never thought of it (or the programmers capable of it). Likewise a dearth of interesting 'Tear' interactions. * Use as an added combat obstacle/block prop, tactical Activation of moving boxcars, etc, was negligable. * WORST OF ALL - THIS Was forced into our (RETCON BaSx DLC) Rapture in an even more assinine (lazily cloned garbage nonesensical) way. --- --- --- ' "Rapture" - Not THAT Rapture ' : Ryan being non-religious/atheist would NOT be referencing the Apochalyptical definition of the name. Rapture of the Deep, Rapture (joy) of being Freed from a World bent on stealing the Freedoms of the Individual, those would be more fitting. --- --- --- Management Skills (in MMORPG New Rapture) ''' : Missions where YOU recruit other Players (or NPCs) to carry out a sequence of related Mission objectives : YOU become the Quest-Giver (or Quest-Middleman) and Recruiter. Secondary rewards to you (beside the rewards you 'hand out' to the 'operators' - Players/NPCs) - test you skill at hiring cheap ... (anything (interactions) you do with NPCs pretty much has to be 'canned' options, but Dialog Trees are one of the Player Created Assets which can be hugely expanded and varied). Some of the City Job (roleplaying) Missions have this (where you are a middle manager who organizes stuff) -- Recruiting Players or finding NPCs to do the needed work/project. City would have 'contracts' to get something done, and it would take a period of time (employing the Auto-Generation capability for presenting partial progress at the mission site (like building stuff), and the NPC(s) doing the approprite activities. The Players may do some of the work themselves (including with their Team NPCs, though those may feel themselves unworthy of mundane gruntwork, and rather feel better when employing their specialties). It might be interesting to get a Dilbert-like revelation about how government bureacracies usually operate (illustrating why Ryan hated big government so much). --- --- --- '''Opponents (NPCs) You Can Relate To : It is interesting that they made (in BS1/BS2/DLC/BaSx) the Splicers mostly human (compared to many of the concept art proposals, some of which were real horrors). Thus they didn't go much for the Empathy/Sympathy angle possible there. The few times they get shown as being tragic figures didn't stop you from shooting them in the face. It being a 'Shooter' game, it was simpler to just have them attack you on sight, rather than also have some other interactive activities/behaviors -- like a more complicated 'running away' (not that complicated actually to program), or opponents you were given more ways to avoid. Most encounter situations were structured using an initial scene setting/placement/verbage, which then devolved into the "Scream and Run At You Murderously" standard NPC behavior. In the MMORPG, far more complicated situations/behaviors can be encountered/explored. It does take a great deal of Effort, Skill, Imagination, Time, Planning and Coordination to significantly personalize/humanize Splicers. Asset Creating Players and Process could do that - to fill in the huge bulk of such detail which Solo games (and even most MMORPGs) just don't have. --- --- --- Nails For Their Coffin : Irrational : You just need to look at the contents of irrationalgames.com to see the endless hype and marketing stuff they claimed, which later then fell apart and never was delivered. As has been said : "Talk is Cheap", but it looks like they spent far too much money/resources on all that "Talk", rather than on actually producing a good game. Apparently they fooled themselves with all that talk, and alot of Effort was wasted on things that never panned out, coupled with simple mismanagement . Nails in their own coffin, one interview at a time. Did the game even pay for itself or make ANY profit ? Unfortunately success is defined by things like that. --- --- --- Vox as Bad as the Founders : The Storytelling fell down (again) when the 'Vox' (and any of the downtrodden who were thrust into your face) simply didn't LEAVE Columbia when they had the opportunity -- like most anyone else who was smart/sane would have done (no bits of story even hints of attempts of that, or the measures made to stop them). People of that time were more resourceful. 'Protests' at THAT time were things that didn't get you much, or other alternatives were available (ie- skedaddling). Maybe Levine&Co somehow thought that most young people don't see that Occupy 'Movement' thing as crybaby imbiciles, and shaped the story accordingly (trying to be 'relevant'again ...) ? So the game writers hadn't the imagination to create a story explaining why the 'downtrodden' underclass was really trapped (they weren't properly shown to have been thwarted by Police State control). Of course that leaves them conveniently available only now (when YOU play the game) for 'revolt' and 'revenge' - so they could have the latter part of the game's 'shocking' shoot-em-up wrack and ruin setting (really just more of the same overblown murderous violence which unimaginitive game makers employ). Note - when the revolt happens, and freedom is available, the underclasses don't simply leave, as they WOULD in real life, but are shown to be murderous vengeful thugs themselves (so you can mass kill them too). Daisy Fitzroy was originally a criminal in a prison before Fink scooped her up (BTW, what a great idea for menials in Columbia's white peoples' houses ??). For what (never mentioned) crime exactly was "Daisy" in 'Prison' ? (Recall also : the backstory of her murdering the doctor who tried to HELP and save her). Convenient snap-together character 'genius' revolutionary, No ? More a Sociopath, No ?? Not all that much a tragic figure worthy of empathy. Revolution contrived for the game - A different dimension is it ? Perhaps that Columbia universe, minus all the earlier-game-shown Police State (without all that heavily-armed police army, the Heavy Hitters, etc ...) that should-have/would-have so easily stepped on any uprising like a bug ? Yes, interdimensional travel to parallel (but conveniently different) worlds/universes is a VERY easy story crutch. Scalps on a wall .... but wait - in that dimension Booker the 'Lil Injun' was already well dead - so Daisy and her crew carried out THAT attrocity ?? Daisy is ready to murder a child ? Well for a Shooter game you DO have to Shovel it on Thick to explain/justify the standard mass-violence of such games - to your typical Player. --- --- --- 'Sofia Lamb's Wish-Washy Philosophy (An Independant Analysis) ' : "Dr. Sofia Lamb's collectivist transhumanism exists in clear opposition to the individualist ideals of Andrew Ryan. As the antagonist in BS2, she is easily more loathsome than Ryan (and even Frank Fontaine). The BioShock sequel never really manages to present her Philosophy as BS1 did for Ryan. Lamb claims to have "the Common Good" as her objective, but it is incoherent as it is never made clear what that "Common Good" is. Lamb's perspective on that never becomes clear. Several times Lamb takes actions that causes the deaths of large numbers of her own followers, for no apparent gain. Little 'common good' is evident. Lamb's cadre however is offered fulfillment of individual wishes. She encourages Simon Wales to take religious orders, offers Grace Holloway a family, and dangles her approval before a smitten Gil Alexander. These followers become her fanatical devotees and are made Delta's opponents. Their fate is eventually left to the Player's choice. Lamb herself has a proprietary attachment to her Daughter, and has an antagonism toward that daughter's protective 'Father'. Lamb's own beliefs are so slippery in practice, that it is never made clear whether they are fanatically held, or just cynically expounded, and she swerves between these extremes over the course of the game." --- --- --- --- --- . . . . .